Prawo spadkowe vs. sprawiedliwa sukcesja obiektów dziedzictwa kulturowego?
The law of inheritance vs. the just succession of the cultural property?

Summary/Abstract: Heirless property in European countries is typically inherited by the state. However, the routine application of this rule to assets belonging to victims of the German genocide during WWII continues to raise doubts. The recognition of a moral responsibility towards Holocaust victims in the Terezin Declaration legitimates the international debate on tensions between inheritance law and justice. The lack of a universal model for the succession of heirless Jewish cultural property acknowledged by this Declaration provokes different recommendations. One of the possibilities is the collective cultural restitution notion as a countermeasure to the crime of cultural genocide. This theory links the reinterpretation of the concept of genocide presented by Lemkin in 1944 with the restitution actions of Jewish succession organizations in 1940s and 50s. The theory mentioned is challenged in the article. The analysis is based on historical arguments, i.e. Lemkin’s focus on criminal liability and the specific nature of legal grounds for Jewish succession organizations after WWII. The history of inheritance law provides arguments to recommend another innovative way of dealing with the heirless property forming part of genocide victims’ inheritance. It is reasonable to distinguish between solutions pro futuro and those possible today. The paper concludes with a recommendation to supplement the Genocide Convention with specific rules about the heirless property of genocide victims. The state responsible for committing genocide should be eliminated from the inheritance of bona vacantia in favour of local successor organizations appointed by an international penal tribunal. Cultural property should be excluded from universal succession in the case of genocide and regarded as a legal person that continues victims’ remembrance. Currently, this model can inspire Polish policy regarding heirless Jewish cultural property. It should be focused on three goals: for objects to remain in Poland, the creation of a new complex database of objects accessible online and, if possible, the exhibition of objects alongside information about their last respective owners who died heirless.

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